by Eric Vall
Suddenly, my body moved against my will as I threw out my arms to my sides.
A blue wave of energy blasted from me and threw my friends backward. I heard Erin yelp in pain as she tumbled across the rocky landscape, but my vision was starting to darken, and I couldn’t see her.
Gunshots rang out as Gawain fired, but nothing came close to hitting me. I managed to move my gaze far enough to see his bullets sweeping harmlessly across the field toward Phi herself, and she casually sidestepped each shot without a hint of effort.
“You’ll never hit me!” she taunted across the distance as she beat her white wings and took to the air. “Better sacrifice your precious leader if you want to stop this.”
My heart sank, since I knew Gawain would never turn his gun on me. My fury grew, and I pushed helplessly against Phi’s grip over my mind. I couldn’t let her hurt my teammates.
Sweat poured down my forehead, but Phi couldn’t be stopped. She waved her hands and twitched her fingers in a spell unknown to me.
I recognized it as soon as a small, black rip appeared in the fabric of the Shadowscape.
She was opening a rift, but not just any normal rift.
The portal gaped open quickly, and an awful tearing sound split the air and made my ears ring. The ground shook and groaned as the rift tore open. I thought it would stop at any moment, but it kept growing larger and larger.
“What the hell is that?” Varleth shouted from somewhere off to my side.
“This was what I needed all along,” Phi laughed across the shadowscape. “Gryff, you played right into my hands. Now witness what we can create together. I don’t even need you to agree, my beautiful puppet. I’ll just pull on your strings until you give me everything I want. Sera is nothing. I am everything.”
I couldn’t help but share in Varleth’s horror. The rift was enormous, almost a hundred feet high and just as far across. It dwarfed my vision as it finally came to a stop in its growth. Golden chains snapped into existence around its borders, and they rattled as they fringed the sides of the enormous portal.
Phi twitched her arms again, and even though my entire body shook with effort, I couldn’t stop her from completing the spell.
The whole rift flashed brightly enough to sear spots into my vision, and when I could see again, nine white rings of glowing energy encircled the golden chains. Red words in an unfamiliar language pulsed from within each ring, and they spun unsteadily in opposite directions in a dizzying effect.
“The permanent rift,” Gawain shouted in horror. “She’s opened it!”
How could this be a permanent rift? It was impossible, unless she had somehow used Sera’s strength to augment her own. I couldn’t waste time thinking about it, though.
I had to put a stop to Phi, or die trying. This bitch wasn’t getting my body for another second.
As the spell neared completion, Phi’s grip relaxed slightly as she sagged with the effort of so much mana spent.
Now was my chance.
My fury coursed through me with uncontrollable passion, and I snatched onto Phi’s presence in my mind. Then I tore at it with all my willpower and shredded her control into fragments.
Yes! Sera shouted in my mind.
Phi startled and lost her grip on my body, and I felt control of it return to me. I slashed at her mind with wild anger as I fought for freedom within my own head.
As I forced Phi back, I suddenly felt Sera’s power rise up next to mine. She was no longer stunned under the weight of Phi’s attack, and she got her footing quickly.
Get out, Sera snapped as her rage matched mine. I chose Gryff first. His body is mine. His power is mine. His seed is mine. He is mine.
Sera’s knifelike mental attacks pierced the wave of Phi’s power, and the Archons struggled with each other while I panted and reinforced the defences around my mind.
“Phi’s weakness is her impatience,” Gawain called to me from across the field. “When she attacks, she leaves her defences wide open. Don’t worry about your own mind, just take advantage of that!”
My eyes watered as I gritted my teeth in response to the power throbbing through my head. It would be hard to abandon my focus on my walls, but I trusted Gawain to know the best way to defeat Phi.
I dropped half of my shields and worked quickly as I sent out a probing thought toward Phi’s vague sense of center. What I found there was soft and unprotected, so I hardened my probe into a rapier. I imagined the sharp point and the quick flashing edge of it, and then I stabbed my newly-fashioned weapon deep into Phi’s tender defences.
Phi shrieked and recoiled from my attack. How dare you!
She reared back and gathered her gold chains and whips of power for another attack, but she never got the opportunity. Sera flashed out with a knifelike spear of power, and Phi’s mental attack crumpled inward like a crushed paper bag.
The enormous rift collapsed in on itself with a roar of thunder. The white rings exploded into flashes of light, and the chains were sucked into the portal as the swirling darkness sealed up. The final black eye of the rift sealed shut, and with a pop, the rift was gone.
“Get out,” I snarled as I stabbed into Phi’s mind with a single deep blow.
Phi cried out wordlessly in pain and dismay, and her mental attack retreated entirely from my head.
My ears rang with the onslaught, and blood ran from my nose, but somehow, I was left with my mind intact.
Sera’s presence glowed with the pride of victory as she soaked in the glory of defeating Phi in a mental battle.
It is just as I suspected, Sera purred in my mind.
“What?” I choked out.
Your power … her words faded in and out of my mind. Nevermind. Together, we are strong. We can destroy her completely. Let’s do it. I want to taste her tears and bathe in her blood. Come on, Gryff, glorious vengeance awaits us.
I wasn’t feeling too glorious as I wiped blood from my face, but it was a good idea to follow Sleet’s mission and recover Phi if we could.
My team didn’t look like they were in awful shape, but I still worried whether we could hope to take on the white-winged Archon on her home turf. What else could we do? We had to stop her, or she would be able to use the permanent rift to wreak untold damage on Mistral.
“Get her,” I croaked. “Don’t let her escape.”
While I was being attacked mentally, Phi had risen to hover above us like an avenging angel, and she was far out of reach of most of our attacks.
Layla’s keichim darted out alongside Kalon as the two monsters swept into the sky to attack. I fumbled for my pyrewyrm crystal on my bandolier, but I wasn’t confident I could control my monsters right now.
They never got the chance to attack her anyway. Phi thrust out her white wings and glowed with a blue aura as she gathered her power.
“I’ll be back!” Phi screeched. “I know now what you are, Gryff. You should have taken my offer. My sister can’t protect you next time. I’ll claim you, and once you are mine, it will be the end for your kind.”
Her white wings beat powerfully as she mantled them, and then Phi burst from the sky with dizzying speed. I tried to follow her path with my eyes, but she flew more like a shooting star than a bird, and she quickly disappeared into the stormy skies of the Shadowscape.
I’ll destroy her for this insolence, Sera seethed, but her anger had no outlet.
Phi had escaped, but at least she hadn’t managed to open the permanent rift.
I collapsed and coughed as the danger of the situation sank in. I’d almost fallen completely prey to Phi’s mental attacks and just barely escaped with my body as my own.
My team ran up to me with worry in their eyes.
“Gryff, are you okay?” Erin asked as she bent to look at me.
“I’m fine, I’m fine,” I reassured them all.
“By the Maker,” Orenn breathed, “she has to be the most terrifying monster I’ve ever seen.”
“She scares the shit out of
me,” I admitted as I wiped the sweat from my forehead. “She’s at least in the nine most powerful monsters we’ll ever meet. I almost couldn’t stand up to her.”
“I think Sleet may have underestimated her,” Varleth said as his dark eyes shone with concern. “I don’t think the seven of us can hope to bring her in without seriously stacking the deck in our favor. An Archon in the Shadowscape might as well be a god.”
“I can’t believe she almost got you,” Layla added as she threw her arms around me in a relieved hug.
“It was a close one,” I said with a thin smile as I hugged Layla back. “I think Sera was the only thing that kept me from complete possession.”
“You did well,” Gawain said seriously. “I … I’m sorry I couldn’t do the same.”
“Nonsense,” I assured him with a frown. “You had to last for months, and you had no idea what was happening. We didn’t know anything about Archons when all of this started, so how could you expect to stand up to Phi?”
Gawain smiled, but he looked away with guilt in his eyes. I would have to talk to him more later, since I didn’t want the shame to eat him alive.
“I hated hearing her slimy voice in my head,” Cyra added with a shiver. “I don’t know how you can listen to Sera all day.”
I sound nothing like that insolent child, Sera hissed.
“She does drive me a little insane,” I said with a weary tone.
If you don’t watch your mouth, I won’t show you how to open a rift to get home, Sera admonished with a dangerous lilt to her voice. Care to live in the Shadowscape for the rest of your mortal life?
Come to think of it, Sera’s voice really was quite lovely.
That’s better, the dark Archon purred.
“What did Phi mean when she said she ‘knew what you are now?’” Varleth asked me.
“I’m not sure,” I said. “Maybe Sera knows.”
Hmmm … I’ll keep that secret for now. That is, unless you want to free me. Then I’ll tell you and give you everything you want, Gryff. Just think about it.
I rolled my eyes at her vague riddles. “She said it’s a secret, and she’d tell me if I gave in to her, but I’m not going to.”
My friends nodded, but their matching frowns spoke to how worried they were.
All things in their own time, Sera said nonchalantly before her voice turned seductive. Eventually, you will give into me. Eventually, you will desire my power just as I desire yours. Eventually, we will be lovers in your mind and body. Then we will reshape our worlds as we see fit. You won’t have a choice.
“I’ll always have a choice,” I huffed to her. “You can’t win against me.”
Oh, poor Gryff. You don’t understand. I don’t want to win. I want to help you. You just don’t understand who’s side you are really on.
But you will soon.
Chapter 19
Sera gave careful instructions as she directed me once again on how to open the rift.
Once more, the mental images flashed through my head, but I didn’t need half as much explanation this time to understand how to do the ritual. I thrust my mana into the waiting spell, and it ate up my magic eagerly as the black eye of the rift peeled open. It swelled to a size of about ten-by-ten feet, and the roiling muggy darkness of the rift interior yawned at us.
“Okay,” I gasped. “Everybody in. You too, Gawain.”
“You’re really one-of-a-kind, Gryff,” Gawain said as he blinked and stared at the portal. “You’re still in charge despite Sera’s power. I didn’t have any idea … ”
He trailed off uncomfortably as he looked away, but I leaned forward to put a comforting hand on his shoulder.
“It’s okay,” I reassured the fire mage. “Anybody would’ve fallen the way you did. And look, now we have all the ciphers back plus a bunch of information we didn’t know before. No real harm was done.”
Varleth and Layla shot me significant looks in tandem, as if to remind me about the town Gawain had destroyed while in the grip of Phi’s possession.
I shook my head slightly in response. We could deal with that one later. For now, I wanted all of my friends back in the human world so I could check them for injuries in safety.
I waited as all six of my teammates walked through the rift, then I followed after quickly.
When I emerged into the desert of the Ortych Sands, a stranger was waiting for me.
Her hood hung low over her face, and she stood a distance away from me and my team, but I knew exactly who she was. I’d encountered her at the volcano when we’d gone to get that cipher, and she’d asked to see my father’s dagger. I knew almost nothing about her, but it had to be the same woman. Her outfit was exactly the same, and her dark ensemble was complete with black gloves that obscured her hands.
I pulled off my mask as my team turned to look at me.
“Gryff,” Erin greeted worriedly as the rift closed behind me. “She says she wants to speak to you.”
“Alright,” I replied with a frown. “I’ll go over and talk to her. I wonder what she wants this time.”
“You know her?” Orenn asked in a bewildered tone. “Who the fuck is she?”
“No clue,” I admitted as I shrugged a shoulder in helpless confusion. “The last time I saw her, she said some weird, vague shit and disappeared into a portal.”
“A portal?” Layla repeated. “Is she human?”
“She sounds like bad news,” Varleth muttered as he cast a suspicious eye in the stranger’s direction. “Maybe we should walk away.”
“I don’t think she’s going to just let me leave,” I said consideringly as I watched the silent woman. “She seemed pretty confident about her strength last time.”
“What do you mean?” Gawain questioned.
“Well, she threatened me a little, I guess,” I admitted reluctantly.
“And you just want to walk over to her for a second meeting?” Varleth asked in exasperation. “Maker, it’s a miracle you’re still alive.”
I grinned and patted him on the shoulder comfortingly. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll be fine.”
Then I waved goodbye to my teammates and began to cross the desert sand.
The truth was I wasn’t so confident. I walked toward the cloaked woman on stiff legs that ached from running and fighting, and a wicked headache was starting to set in from my mental battle with Phi. I was covered in tiny cuts and scratches from debris that fell during our battles, and I felt ready to collapse into bed and sleep for days.
“What do you want?” I asked in a raised voice as I approached the stranger.
A sudden breeze blew through the desert, and her cloak rippled in the wind. She watched me and said nothing.
I frowned and continued my walk until I stood just a few feet away from the stranger.
“Well?” I asked as I narrowed my eyes. “What do you want?
The woman hesitated and scanned me carefully before she spoke.
“I apologize for my behavior last time we met,” she said, and her voice came out melodic and sensual. “I was taken off guard, and I didn’t know how to react.”
“Why were you taken off guard?” I questioned.
“Your presence at the cipher location … surprised me,” she explained in a low purr. “That’s all.”
“Alright,” I said agreeably.
I didn’t exactly believe her, but it didn’t seem likely I could get any real answers.
“My name is Jace,” she introduced herself shortly.
“Nice to meet you, Jace,” I responded with caution. “I’m Gryff.”
“I see,” Jace responded in a smooth voice. “I … ”
She didn’t speak again after she trailed off. The silence between us stretched and grew uncomfortable.
“Are you okay?” I asked.
“I am fine,” she responded quickly. “I’ve simply been in the Shadowscape for a long time.”
“A long time?” I echoed with curiosity.
Jace said nothing
as she gazed at me from under her dark hood. I couldn’t really see her face, but she had an alluring voice, and the shape of her body looked both elegant and deadly.
“Uh, okay,” I murmured uncertainly. “What are you doing here?”
“I felt a flux of energy between this realm and the Shadowscape,” Jace answered as she shifted subtly from one foot to the other. “I consider it my duty to investigate such disturbances.”
The fact she moved at all was a significant tell. I suspected she was actually pretty worried about this situation, yet she had arrived only to find no threat at all. The only thing here was my team, rather than the humanity-ending portal she probably expected.
“Would it be a permanent rift that you sensed?” I asked to confirm my theory.
Jace nodded without saying a word.
“The spell didn’t complete, so it collapsed in on itself,” I explained.
“How?” she asked.
“I fought against Phi and--”
“You stopped her?” Jace interrupted me.
“I don’t know how Phi managed to get it open in the first place,” I continued. “Do you have any idea?”
“You said you stopped her?” she asked again.
I frowned and furrowed my brows. “Uhh, yeah. Or so I think.”
“But you don’t know how she opened it?” the cloaked woman asked as she crossed her arms. “You had nothing to do with that?”
“How would I be able to open--”
“The Archon is powerful and clever,” she cut in.
“Hey,” I growled, “if you have something to say about me, just say it. I went there to save my friend, not to help an Archon destroy the world.”
“It might be too late for that.” Jace glanced away into the distance of Ortych Sands as she avoided my gaze.
“That’s not really an answer!” I groaned. “I need to know what the hell happened. If you have answers, could I please have them?”
Jace looked back to me and shook her head. “I have no answers for you. It is too early to say.”
“Too early to say?” I repeated as I shook my head in confusion. “What do you--”
